Stewart Regan unhappy with ‘undignified and irresponsible’ comments

Scottish Football Association chief executive Stewart Regan has hit back at criticism of the governing body’s handling of the Rangers crisis and has labelled some comments from the Ibrox club as “undignified” and “irresponsible”.

The SFA reached agreement last week to transfer Rangers’ membership from the old company to the new but in a lengthy process that also included the Scottish Premier League and the Scottish Football League, Regan was one of those singled out as having contributed to a difficult situation.

The chief executive insisted that he wanted to move on but acknowledged the deep feeling among fans of the Ibrox club.

“I think when you look at fans, they will always carry the emotion for their club,” Regan said.

“The Rangers fans have been through a lot in the last few months.

“They’ve seen changes of leadership at the top of the club, a period without any leadership and the club drifting from place to place over that time.

“We have to act in the best interests of the game. We have to make sure that the sporting sanctions are applied, for the integrity of the game, and we’ve done that.

“Some people don’t like those decisions. They’re entitled to that opinion but we have to do what’s right and that’s what we’ve done.”

Rangers manager Ally McCoist was one of those who had voiced his displeasure, claiming there had been a “lack of leadership” from Hampden.

“Ally’s one of the few people remaining at the club that the fans can associate with so he’s clearly going to try and defend the club’s position,” Regan responded.

“Some of the comments that have been made by a number of individuals in recent weeks have been quite undignified and have been quite irresponsible at times.

“I think a number of comments have been made over recent weeks. I’m not prepared to go into individual comments, I think we’re all aware of things that have been said.

“I wish to rise above that. I don’t want dirty washing aired in public, I’ve said that on several occasions. I won’t get into that, what I will say is that we remain focused on doing what is in the best interests of Scottish football.”

SFA membership

Regan explained that the protracted process that finally saw Rangers given temporary SFA membership less than 48 hours before their first game of the season was necessarily lengthy because all parties had to clear up a number of issues before agreement was reached.

“I think when you’re looking at taking a new company back in the league, and accepting a new company as a member there are always going to be challenges,” he said.

“In this particular case, there were a series of charges relating to the oldco that were hanging over and that still needed to be considered.

He added: “The board’s view was that as part of [SFA Articles of Association] 14.1 and as part of the terms and conditions that would be applied to that membership, the new company had to accept that what happened previously needed to come forward for the good of the game and for the fairness of the game.

“That’s the stance that the board took. We negotiated long and hard with newco and the other parties around the table, the SPL and the SFL, also had considerations that they wanted to put in play.

“So that’s why it was a long and drawn-out process that only concluded when we got the final pieces of information late last week and the contracts were actually signed late on Friday night.”

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